Seriously 'weird' anti-aircraft guns

[brendo]

Hi all,

I am having a good time here in Aces High, but there is one thing which I dont understand.

What is going on with the acks emplacements?

Whenever I approach them, they just continually fire at a million rounds per minute and track me like they are radar guided!

I cant suprise them.... they fire at me at 0 feet when I try to bounce them..... even BEFORE I can see them!

If I fly above them, circling, they just keep firing, so if I try to strafe, the very instant I am in rang I get shot!

I cannot trick them with manouvers becasue they track me perfectly and dont stop shooting even for a milii-second.

Whats going on here?

Tnx

[Ripsnort]

Hiya Brendo,
I hate to tell you this, but they were worse before!  They've chilled them out alittle.  Jinx, squirm, don't fly in straight line.

Acks are tougher in AH than WB's, it promotes furballs rather than vulch fests.

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Ripsnort(-rip1-)
I/JG2~Richthofen~
JG2 Communications Officer
Aces High Training Corps
JG2 "Richthofen"
 
Turning Spitfires into Bud Lite cans since 1992

[This message has been edited by Ripsnort (edited 04-14-2000).]

[funked]

Brendo, I concur, they are a joke.  They are slightly less like a Phalanx CIWS than they were before 1.02, but they are still more appropriate for Falcon 4.0 than a WW2 Sim.

Anybody who has experience firing anti-aircraft weapons (like my father) will tell you that the ability of these weapons to estimate lead is simply not possible in real life without electronic sensors and a fire control computer.

But we have to live with them I guess.  The key to evading them is to pull gees AND change your lift vector - roll a little bit.

[Ghosth]

They can be tricked however, well at least when comeing in at a distance.

If you pull up just a bit when you first see them coming your way, then drop nose when they get to you. You can bob up and down a bit untill you are close enought to drop a bomb or strafe. You'll avoid 80% or so of the fire.

Trick is to never fly straight in any dir.
Almost constant change is required.
You'll still take some hits, but it's surviveable.



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Maj Ghosth
XO 332nd Flying Mongrels

[bloom25]

I don't have a problem evading the acks anymore, but I do have a suggestion.  Lets make the acks fire in 2 second bursts or something.  Then they have to stop for 1 second to reload.  It would look a little more realistic at least.



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bloom25
THUNDERBIRDS

[Smut]

What you are missing with the current AAA gun implementation is that, probably mostly for framerate reasons, each field has a tiny fraction of the guns protecting it that real WW2 era airfields (particularly late war German) had.

Given the choice between hundreds of ("realistically" aimed) guns with framerate that you measure with a calender, or a few accurate guns with a high framerate, I'll take the latter option, thank you very much.

That said, I do think there is merit to having the existing guns fire in bursts, and to give them the ability to be "surprised" by a sudden attack. Long term, I'd also like to see different types of AAA, but I understand that is already in the works for the future.

-Smut

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XO, The squealing Pigs
"Oink! Oink! To War!"

[funked]

Smut, saying a few radar-guided-laser-AAA turrets are equivalent to a few dozen WW2 AAA guns is like saying a few B-2's are equivalent to a few dozen B-17.  

Maybe they are equivalent in terms of damage caused, but in terms of tactics, realism, immersion, etc, they are not equivalent.

Also there were plenty of airfields that had little to no AAA defense - a few MG's manned by those support troops who could make it from their normal job to the guns in time to fire back at a raid.

[This message has been edited by funked (edited 04-15-2000).]

[Smut]

Funked,

Actually, by say late 1944, virtually every active LW field could muster far more than "a few dozen" guns. They were very well defended. Remember many of the USAAF 8th AF best fighter pilots were shot down during low level strafing attacks, in fact I'm willing to bet more were lost this way than in actual air to air combat.

BTW, I think the LW field defense model is valid for AH because the LW bases were under heavy pressure at that point in the war...much like in the general arena of AH.

-Smut

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XO, The squealing Pigs
"Oink! Oink! To War!"

[-towd_]

yea they salvaged the guns from all the bases we had turned into (craters)

[funked]

Smut, that's cool, but that's one theatre in a narrow time period.  It was a WORLD war.    

I don't find it interesting, fun, etc. to fight WW3 acks in a WW2 airplane.  They are not appropriate for this game.  PERIOD!

See Brand W for properly done acks with dispersion, aiming errors, lag time, supression, etc.  

[This message has been edited by funked (edited 04-15-2000).]

[Wraith]

Well, I'm no programmer, but it would be nice to have that 2 second fire burst, 1 sec delay and have a bit of randomness to their shots... say, 1 out of every 3 shots will be a laser guided shot, the other 2 could have a random aim in a 20 degree cone firing towards the target.

[Fatty]

If the ack gets much easier than it already is, imo, it might as well not be there.

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Fatty
FAT DRUNK BASTARDS